April 8, 2008

Will Oremus reports in the San Mateo Daily News that a woman who paints her homes and cars with rants about government conspiracies has been evicted from her house in Belmont, but she refuses to leave. "Estrella Benavides, who already lost her San Mateo house to foreclosure, will go to trial next week for continuing to occupy a home on Beresford Avenue in Belmont after it, too, was repossessed and sold. The new owners are suing to evict her....The 48-year-old Nicaraguan immigrant has fallen into a deep hole since she first began painting cryptic messages all over the front of her San Mateo home in 2006. Two cities are suing her for violations of their residential sign codes, two of her houses have been foreclosed upon for lack of payment, and she has no steady income. Benavides, who believes the government is controlled by a mafia bent on mind control and child abuse, says she believes God will protect her no matter what happens. 'I can guarantee you he will not put me on the street,' she said after her initial hearing Monday. She cited a $5,000 gift she recently received from an anonymous benefactor as evidence of the Lord's intervention in her life." Read more.